Alright, get your brains fired up and ready to think.
I did this but it didn't work right. I measure the thickness of my springs, just a shade under 2.25". Measured the thickness of my axle with the old perch, 3.5" i think, together that makes 5.75". Okay, so i lugged the axle out from under the truck, and man that sucker is heavy! Anyways, took it to the machine shop, showed the welder what i wanted done with the new perches and then i showed him the shackles and told him i wanted 5.75" cut off and new holes drilled. No problem so far right? Well he was good enought to squeeze me in today cause he was busy, so i wasn't complaining, but he did an excellent job welding and cutting. Got home put the shackles, little oh things, on the truck, hooked up my springs, waited for my buddy to get there to help get the axle out of my truck and on the ground. He gets there and we start hooking things up and i start to notice that something isn't right. Well, i'm not sure how it happened but i came up with this:
Now tell me something isn't right there???? I don't know how it happened, but if i were to have left the shackles untouch then i swear on everything i have it would have given me over 10" lift, and i'm not kidding. Come to find out the shackles are cut at 5", not 5.75". I measure from the bottom of the perch on the bottom to the top of the top leaf spring after the conversion and it came up to be 7". My shackles can't get any shorter because when i put the axle on they are hitting the frame, with out the axle they were fine, here look:
If i were to put my 31" tire on the truck right now in the drive way i could drive away and i would have over a foot of clearance. This has been the worst week of my life so far, everything that could go wrong is going wrong. My grandpa is dying, i worked on my fiancee's legacy wagon (which i will never do again) all freaking week cross threading every freaking bolt, and now this didn't work out.
Someone tell me what i did wrong. The new perches are a little higher then old ones, but not enought to make up that many inches. I am really close to going to a junk yard and picking up an 8.8 off of a ranger and also getting the leaf spring brackets off the frame because in order for the ranger to set up like it does, the brackets are on the out side of the frame and back one, is actually above the bottom of the frame if i remember right. Someone help, i'm going to have to convert this thing back over in the morning which isn't a big deal, just a pain in the butt. I only spent about $60 on everything with labor so it's not like it killed but this should have worked and i want to know where i messed up. Thanks!
Happy trails!!
